Europe

From Russian state media outlet Sputnik comes the surprising news that Belarus has banned cannabis cultivation with a Dec. 31 decree from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection. The surprise isn't that growing was banned—but that it hadn't been banned already. The former Soviet republic's best claim to fame is as "Europe's last dictatorship." Strongman Alexander Lukashenko has been in power for over 20 years now, resorting to probable fraud and definite repression to hold on to the presidency. After Lukashenko was accused of stealing the 2010 elections, there was a popular protest movement, put down wth mass arrests—with the opposition candidate himself sentenced to prison for inciting riots! No surprise that Lukashenko was "re-elected" with virtually no opposition in 2015. In last September's parliamentary elections, a few opposition candidates were for the first time allowed to take seats, leading some Belarus-watchers to hope for a "thaw." But Lukashenko is still running a very tight ship. Not exactly the kind of place you'd expect to be cannabis-friendly.

On Dec. 29, Finland's former drug czar, Jari Aarnio, was sentenced by a district court in Helsinki to a 10-year prison term on charges of smuggling nearly 800 kilograms of hashish into the country from the Netherlands. Aarnio stepped down as head of Helsinki's drug squad—the highest anti-narcotics post in the country—in 2013, when he was charged wth corruption in a case related to his interest in a company that sold surveillance equipment to his own force. The investigation in that case unleashed new revelations, ultimately leading to his indictment along with 12 other defendants in the hashish scheme. The ring is said to have brought in the 800 kilos (1,760 pounds) in barrels between 2011 and 2012. The court ordered that Aarnio be taken into custody immediately, and he is now locked up in Helsinki's Vantaa Prison.

It is now one year since Albania, trying to live down its pariah status as Europe's top cannabis producer, officially declared itself "marijuana-free," after a crackdown undertaken with Italian police aid. But an on-the-scene BBC News report, filed Dec. 1, informs us that the impoverished Balkan country retains the title of the largest producer of outdoor-grown cannabis, at least. Close-up shots of the drying harvest in one village are provided. The crop is described as "green gold" for Albania's struggling farm communities. "In a poor nation, it's a billion-euro industry."

The British government's Medicines & Healthcare Regulatory Agency (MHRA) on Oct. 11 issued a finding that cannabidiol (CBD) has a "restoring, correcting or modifying" effect on "physiological functions." The Independent calls the move "a potential milestone in the campaign to legalise cannabis and bring about evidence-based laws regarding drugs." The review of CBD, a non-psychoactive cannabinoid increasingly studied for its therapeutic value, was undertaken following discussions with MediPen, a London-based company that seeks to market a CBD vaporizer.

German authorities just took the unprecedented move to allow a medical marijuana patient to cultivate at home. The obscurely named Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM) announced on Oct. 2 that a multiple sclerosis sufferer from Mannheim, in Baden-Württemberg state, will be permitted to grow a maximum of 130 plants a year. But the grow must be confined to an extremely restricted space in his bathroom. Terms of the permit stipulate that any leftover plants or harvested herb must be destroyed, and the buds must be kept in a "secure storage unit."

Amid moves toward peace in Colombia, the goad of the war—the country's lucratice cocaine trade—clearly remains robust. In an international operation announced June 30, Colombian police joined with US and Italian authorities to confiscate a whopping 11 tons of cocaine in refrigerated containers ostensibly shipping tropical fruits to Europe. The stuff was mostly seized in Colombia, but was bound for the US and Europe. Of the 33 arrested in the operation, 22 were popped in Colombia and the rest in Italy. (El Tiempo, June 30)

The trial of a paralyzed man who was prosecuted by Swedish authorities for self-medicating with cannabis has sparked debate over legalization in the Scandinavian nation, according to a March 27 report in Sweden's English-language The Local. Andreas Thörn, 37, who broke his neck in a motorcycle accident in 1994, used cannabis for relief from neuropathic pain as well as anxiety and depression. He was initially acquitted in August 2015 after successfully using a medical defense. Thörn said he had tried numerous pharmaceuticals which did not help, and had run out of legal options. Claes Hultling, spinal injury specialist at the Karolinska Institute, testified that studies indicate barely a fifth of spinal cord patients can be treated with the drugs available today.

It started when gunmen disguised as a police SWAT team opened fire with assault rifles on boxing fans gathered for weigh-in ceremonies at Dublin's Regency Hotel Feb. 5, killing one man and wounding two others. The fatality was a young man named David Byrne. Escaping injury was the star of the show, Jamie Kavanagh, who was scheduled to contest the WBO European lightweight title the following night. The Continuity IRA claimed responsibility for the hit, saying it planned to carry out further attacks "on drug dealers and criminals." The statement blamed Byrine for the assassination of a Real IRA militant in 2012. But days later, CIRA released a new statement, denying involvement. The confusion could be due to factionalism in the Irish Republican movement. Or did gang hitmen issue the first statement, hoping to scapegoat CIRA for the hit? In any case, the Saturday night fight was to have been Kavanagh's first in Dublin since the gangland killings of his father, Gerard, and uncle Paul—both convicted as drug traffickers and lieutenants of Ireland's reigning cocaine kingpin, Christy Kinahan. Gerard was gunned down in an Irish bar in Spain's Costa del Sol in September 2014. Paul was shot to death in his parked car in Dublin in March 2015.